


The Meaning of a Feeling

by olivemeister



Category: Kingdom Hearts
Genre: Gen, Implied/Referenced Abuse, Isolation, Mid-Canon, Minor Violence, Unintentional Redemption
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-30
Updated: 2017-04-30
Packaged: 2018-10-26 00:17:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10775496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/olivemeister/pseuds/olivemeister
Summary: While awaiting their birth by sleep, Ventus and Vanitas are trapped in a stalemate. Though one may win, it seems that neither will truly die. It could be an eternal battle, of course. That was an option. But when two hearts are wounded, an end to the fighting becomes appealing. Even if there is no love lost and much hatred gained, there is always another path. With nothing else to do but fight, Ven asks Vanitas about the Unversed.And strange things happen, when two hearts touch. In the space between memories and emotions, something else can be born.Stumbling towards the road to redemption, but not yet on it.(Post-BBS, but pre-KH1.) Not necessarily romantic, but read it however you want. Brief references to Ven's mistreatment at Xehanort's hands.





	The Meaning of a Feeling

**Author's Note:**

> I did some experimental stuff with the formatting of this fic! Mostly I've messed with alignment, not every paragraph is aligned left in this work. I don't know how it'll display, but I'm hoping it works out okay! It might not display right on mobile, but what're ya gonna do honestly. I'm trying.
> 
> I've been playing a lot of KH ever since the 1.5+2.5 collection came out. The fires of my love were re-kindled, and I remembered how great that big ol' jerk Vanitas was. Here's to him. They put his theme in the "Heroes and Heroines" medley during the KH Orchestra World Tour, so I started wondering how that misbehaving child could reach a point where he could be called a "hero". I figured it could be neat, to explore how his foot could get on that path. Or, at least how he could get aimed in the right direction to get on that path.
> 
> Who knows? Riku got his redemption arc and proved that darkness isn't evil, and Vanitas certainly evokes his image quite a lot. If someone was nice to him, maybe this huge piece of crap could start to change. I just don't think someone with Sora's face could be all bad, is all. But right now, he's a very bad and angry cat and he needs some time. 
> 
> Ten years sounds about right.
> 
> I took some liberties with the physical manifestation of hearts. I felt like what I did with that was a little more meaningful for this story than what is more strictly canon.

A heavy feeling, a feeling of immense and daunting weight.

“I know you’re still here.” His words, thoughts – here, in his sleeping heart, they were almost the same, directed thoughts that became words – echoed out into the emptiness. It was safe, sitting alone on the station of his heart. Where he was, in that boy’s heart, was safe. Ven rested his hands on his knees, and waited.

There was no response, not in words, not in thoughts.

“You won’t answer, huh.” A statement, not a question. It rippled through his heart, sending waves that slowly washed over everything. He wasn’t alone, but it seemed that yet again his words would go unanswered. “I guess that’s fine. I’m just talking to myself anyway.”

Abruptly, he remembered the sensation of gritting his teeth. Not his own memory, but the closest he had come to receiving a reply since their last pointless clash.

Ven had lost track of how many times it had happened, a useless battle. No matter how many times they fought, no matter who won (though, since coming to this place, he had never lost), nothing would change. They both knew that, now. They knew who was stronger.

 

It wasn’t as if he actually wanted to talk to Vanitas.

 

He’d affected the other boy, Ven realized. The surprise he felt from that was a ripple as well, and it met and melded with one that had come from another source. It was faint and vague, a negative feeling that would have once been used to create an Unversed. Every distant emotion he had felt from Vanitas had been negative, but they were so muddled that he couldn’t discern their true form. Was it irritation? Before, when they had fought, he had felt them so strongly. Now, it was unclear.

Ven thought it over again, the words he had “spoken”. As he did so, he remembered another moment, a moment he had not been mentally present for. Two voices that spoke in unison, rising from his throat in a smug drawl.

“ _Correct. I am **not** Ventus.”_

Now, though, Vanitas wasn’t smug. He was just angry. That was what it was – anger. The image of an Unversed flitted across his thoughts, then another, and another. Red faces flashed before him, frowning, frowning, frowning, their expressions a match for the anger he had sensed pouring from Vanitas.

His heart rippled, and then came the sound of Vanitas’s laugh. Bitter. Mocking.

“It never occurred to you, did it. You always were such an idiot.”

“You… they’re not just random.”

“I told you already. They _are_ what I _feel_.” The image of a vial, a gleeful expression. “It’s not my fault if you’re too stupid to understand.”

It was the most contact he had had with Vanitas since their last fight, where he had drowned the other boy in light once more and sent him spinning. Vanitas had faded after that, irritated, frustrated. Ven had sensed overpowering hatred that time, and Vanitas had never approached him again. Not until now.

But, so quickly, he was gone again, and Ven was alone.

It was fine. Hearing the memory of Vanitas’s voice had started to make him sick. He welcomed the silence.

It was just… lonely. The boy he – they – slept quietly in, he was unable to hear them while they were locked in their shared dream. He remembered the first time he had realized he wasn’t alone.

 

“… _you’re here, aren’t you?” The words were pointless. Vanitas was unmistakable, after all that had happened. The slightest flicker of darkness, and he had known. Vanitas was his darkness, the only darkness he had. “Vanitas. You didn’t die.”  
_ __  
“No.” Seething, red-hot, flames that scoured his heart. Anger, hatred, that rebounded inside of him and drew conflicting images of what was hated. Vanitas’s twisted laughter. His own crumpled body. Vanitas’s fingers curled around the joined handle of the blade their hearts’ clash had brought forth. His own voice crying out, “I’m not strong enough!” His own face in tears. Unversed, Unversed, Unversed.

_Who hated what?_

“ _Am I dreaming?”_

_“Don’t be stupid.”_

_“… I don’t think I’m awake, though. I went to sleep, didn’t I? Inside that person… Inside his heart.”_

“ _Of course you’re dreaming.” Sneering. The feeling of a hand around his throat, starting to squeeze. Did he have a throat? Was this the memory of being strangled? He knew who was directing it at him. Vanitas hadn’t shown his face, nor the face of the person the hand belonged to. But it was Vanitas, sending the thought or triggering the memory. Ven didn’t know which. “That doesn’t mean it isn’t real. You brought me here, you **trapped** me in here. We’re dreaming.”_

_Pain. The heaviness of Vanitas’s heart, draping over him and smothering him. Fear. Darkness beginning to tint the stained glass below his feet. Vanitas’s heart, trying once more to encroach upon his._

_The hand, the memory of the hand, fell away, and Ven said nothing._

_He was prepared when Vanitas struck. It was impossible not to be, when he had been able to feel Vanitas readying himself. Hate-rage-pain. His face, Vanitas’s face, the clash of keyblades. Ven pressed forward, braced against what he’d known was coming. The memories weren’t able to shake him, and Vanitas fell back to survey him. The piercing emotion in his eyes, striking yellow, he couldn’t understand it. Without their keyblades at their sides, all they had was their forms and thoughts to use as weapons._

“ _Tch.”_

_Vanitas stepped back into the darkness that surrounded the station of his heart, and faded._

 

Some time later, he felt the faint presence of Vanitas near him again. The feeling of the other boy’s heart – still not whole, just like his – drawing closer to him, the feeling of… reluctance? Softly, he reached out, and asked the question he had held on to.

“Those ones are what you made when you were angry. The Unver- no, what did you call them? You can’t have called them Unversed.” It felt different to “speak” compared to simple thoughts, because it had been so long.

There was no way to tell how much time was passing. But it felt like it was a long time, between his words and the reply.

“I’d ask if you were joking, but I know you aren’t. I can feel it. It would be hilarious if it wasn’t so pathetic. They’re my emotions, nothing more and nothing less. Why would I call them anything else? You really are stupid.”

“Can you quit it, or what?”

“What, does it hurt your feelings when I call you what you are?”

“You’re a broken record.”

Silence, the feeling of his nails biting into his palms. A brute with shields, a flood of Floods. Anger. Irritation.

“Will you…”

Vanitas was gone, fading further away. What he always did when he fled to lick his wounds.

 

“ _You’re pathetic.” A clash. Blows raining down, blows that in the past had staggered his body, knocked the breath from his lungs and covered him in bruises. Now, they glanced off of him. It was… the third time? The fourth time? That Vanitas had stepped foot in his heart once more. Every time it hurt, but his readiness made it hurt less. More than anything, he was determined._

“ _Get out!”_

“ _I won’t. This is supposed to be **mine** , so give up!”_

“ _No!”_

_His punch sent Vanitas stumbling back. They didn’t bleed there, in these forms. Damage only manifested in one way. Vanitas’s cheek, where his blow had struck, had melted away. Not to reveal bone or sinew, simply vanished as if an eraser had been taken to the pencil sketch of his being. Light fragmented off, scattering, and left nothing in its place. It would later collect and remake what was missing._

_If only he could do enough damage to scatter all of Vanitas once more. But it would only be postponing the next attack for longer, and time was meaningless in this place. He couldn’t destroy the other boy completely, not here. Maybe not anywhere. Their hearts were chained together, and the links could never be broken._

_Vanitas kicked him, heavy, the weight of a thousand beings’ hatred. Even braced against it, anticipating it, the force of it sent Ven skidding across the station. Only a few feet – but “feet” were relative, weren’t they? How large or small was his heart? He was nowhere near where Vanitas wanted him to be, nowhere near the edge._

_He never would be, and he wondered if Vanitas was growing to realize this._

“ _A heart filled with light,” he spat, distasteful, filled with contempt. “Why couldn’t you have used it for what it was made for?”_

_And again, fading away was the face of his aggressor._

 

He felt Vanitas’s heart.

“You never remembered me.”

Ven didn’t know what the statement meant. He knew Vanitas wasn’t asking it, that it was something he knew for certain.

“What is that supposed to mean? Of course I remembered you, after all you did.”

“Typical. When I was born, you moron.”

Ven resisted the impulse to roll his eyes. All he remembered was the pain of Master Xehan- of Xehanort’s foot, the agony of his heart being torn asunder, and then the nothingness of sleep. And, the heart that had reached out to his, the heart they now slept within.

Nothing in Vanitas’s original statement had given him any indication of what he’d meant, but he was again being treated as an idiot child for not knowing what those vague words were about. It was as if Vanitas expected him to see the meaning in his…

“Can you… You can read my mind?”

“Your mind? Don’t make me laugh. I can read your heart like an open book. It’s obvious, you’re transparent. It might as well be written on the glass.”

“Vanitas?” The thought had finally occurred to him, though it seemed it hadn’t reached Vanitas just yet. No matter what, Vanitas was always seeing the station of his heart. That was why he was…

Resentful. Annoyed. Frustrated by… Ven’s incompetence.

“ _What_.”

“I can’t see your heart. There’s just darkness.”

Silence. But the statement had staggered Vanitas. More clearly than Ven had felt anything but the other boy’s hatred, he felt confusion radiating out from something far off in the darkness.

Their communication had been unequal.

“You… thought I could see it?”

Vanitas hadn’t known. His irritation, his anger, suddenly became invalid. Vanitas had hated him for willful ignorance, had not even considered that his own heart was hidden. Did Vanitas expect something from him without understanding what it was?

“Vanitas… can _you_ see your heart?”

Vanitas was gone.

 

Blackness in his heart. And, then, stepping silently onto the platform, Vanitas’s foot.

“Do you need something?”

“Your heart.”

“Would you give it a rest? You’re trying too hard now.”

“If you’d just give it to me, then-”

“You’re trying too hard to sound evil. Are you compensating now, because you’ve lost so many times? Need me to beat you again?”

Vanitas stepped back, his footing suddenly uncertain. “What?”

The face of an Unversed – of Vanitas’s emotions. What they had called a Scrapper. Something he had never noticed in the heat of battle, he now saw in Vanitas’s memories. It stood there in his mind’s eye, glancing around quickly, almost anxiously. As Ven stared at Vanitas, his vision of the other boy melded with the Unversed as its clawed hands rose to its arms, and held itself.

Ven felt pain, like talons digging into his biceps.

His eyes wide, Vanitas disappeared.

 

He realized afterward, looking out into the darkness, that Vanitas hadn’t read his heart, hadn’t seen it coming. Was he no longer able to see? Or was he, acting out of spite, refusing to look?

 

“Vanitas.”

“What do you want now.”

Vanitas was never far away. It made Ven wonder. How close to his own was the heart he couldn’t see?

“You said I didn’t remember when you were born.”

“Seems like you’re able to remember that much. I’m surprised.”

“No, you’re not.”

“… How would you know?” A flicker in the corner of his “eye”. It was visible to him, a small fragment of light.

“I don’t need to see your heart to know that. I already know you’re just doing that to try and mock me.” The light vanished, as if swallowed. Ven sighed, looking out to where that brief glimpse of it had appeared. Apprehension faintly touched him. “Anyway… you’re right. I don’t remember any of that. I remember being surrounded by… monsters. Not Unversed. They almost looked like people, but pitch-black, with… yellow eyes.”

Vanitas’s face flashed before his eyes, jet-black hair and piercing yellow eyes, an expression of distaste.

A disdainful sniff.

“Heartless.”

He knew the word, for some reason. Vanitas speaking it had sparked the memory of something he had already known.

“Vanitas… are you a Heartless?”

An Unversed that looked like a human-shaped balloon, with a valve on its back. It inflated, burning from the inside, and, finally, popped.

He almost expected Vanitas to say, “How dare you?” But, instead, the words that came were less volatile, more uncertain.

“No. I’m the darkness from your heart. It’s different.”

“What’s a Heartless, then?”

“A heart that has fallen into darkness and cast off its bodily form.”

“… you sure that’s not the same thing?”

A blue pot. The Scrapper, again.

“… It’s not.”

If he continued on that line of questioning, Vanitas would certainly leave.

“Anyway… I don’t remember much after that. I… passed out. And then, I think I felt Xeha-”

“He kicked us, and then he set me free. You remember that.”

“Us.” The word was surprising. Ven knew it was clear on his face. Vanitas was somewhere close, and he could surely see it even if he no longer glanced at his heart.

“What else would we have been?”

“We weren’t “us”. Back then, you were me.”

The balloon, again. Then a massive jellyfish, translucent, filled with colorful orbs. The creature that planted its roots into the ground and attacked from a distance. No response from Vanitas. But he was still there, listening.

“Do you have all my memories from before then?”

“No. _You_ don’t even have all our memories from before then.”

“ _My_ memo-” Ven fell silent, sitting there on the glass, alone, his legs crossed as he stared down. He wasn’t sure if there was any point to sticking to that distinction. Vanitas wasn’t him, hadn’t been for a long time. Maybe it was stupid or cruel to repeat the fact that back then, they _had_ been one being. But Vanitas had wanted to be one again, hadn’t he? “Do you… remember anything that I don’t?”

“My birth,” Vanitas said, clearly annoyed at repeating himself. A Flood skittered across his thoughts.

“Besides that,” Ven replied, planting his elbow on one knee and leaning into his hand. “Before.”

“I remember being Xehanort’s-” It was interesting. Vanitas didn’t call the man “Master”, not anymore. “- apprentice. I don’t remember anything before that.”

“… Me neither.”

“I _know_ that.”

“You don’t have to be so sharp. You know it scares me, don’t you? That I don’t remember. It’s not like you know what that feels like, though.”

A yellow pot. Vanitas was angry with him. Was he mad, to be reminded that he was an incomplete being?

“Wait, don’t leave.”

“I wasn’t going to,” Vanitas shot back, the lie betrayed by the distance of his “voice”.

“Will you tell me what they are?”

“I won’t tell you again. It’s not my fault if you already forgot or if you were too stupid to understand.”

“You didn’t even ask what “they” meant.”

“I already told you. Heartless are fallen hearts. “The Unversed” are my emotions.”

“No, I mean… Look, just read my heart and you’ll know, won’t you?”

Vanitas grunted, and he felt the other boy’s irritation as another Flood. The jellyfish again, smaller now, replaced it.

“You’re really so stubborn that you won’t look now that you know I can’t see yours?”

A creature that looked like a bat, and flapped away.

“Vanitas, can you still-”

Gone.

Ven had no choice but to give up for now.

 

“ _We weren’t “us”. Back then, you were me.”_

“ _What, does it hurt your feelings when I call you what you are?”_

 

It was a little unexpected when Vanitas stepped out of the shadows. Ven wasn’t sure how long – only relatively speaking – it had been since Vanitas had left him.

“You really want to know my emotions that badly?”

“I do.”

“Tch. Fine, I’ll humor you.”

Ven wondered if Vanitas knew how transparent he was. He didn’t need to see a station and read it with his own heart to know that it was really a desire for attention. It didn’t matter. Isolation, when knowing there was another there, would drive him mad. Vanitas was certainly the same, even as cruel as he was. If he had been entirely alone, Ven knew he could have simply slept until his heart had mended enough to wake.

He wondered how long it would take to heal.

“… right. Then… the one that’s sort of like a mouse, almost. The one that melts into the ground. What emotion makes those?”

“Irritation,” Vanitas spat, clearly feeling it in that moment.

“I figured,” Ven said thoughtfully. It meant his insight into Vanitas’s emotions was, at least a little bit, correct. “Then… the one that looks like a person, but it’s really bottom-heavy. Not the one with the shields, the… normal one?”

Another Flood dashed across his thoughts. Now that Vanitas’s mind was on the creatures once more, it seemed that his memories of them came almost automatically when faced with the emotions they embodied.

“Happiness -” Before he could respond in shock to that, Vanitas held up a hand to say he wasn’t finished. “When people cry.”

“… I see.” It was… disturbing. Did the only joy Vanitas ever feel come from a place of negativity? It made sense, in an awful way. Vanitas had said himself that he crafted the Unversed from negativity, so it surely meant that any seemingly-positive emotions he felt were hiding a dark underside. “Then… the yellow pot?”

“Anger.” There was something more specific, going unsaid.

“What kind of anger?”

“It’s _anger_ ,” Vanitas said sharply, but the Unversed that appeared in their thoughts wasn’t the yellow pot.

“Okay, okay! I get it. The thing that looks lik-”

“I’m bored with this. I’m leaving.”

Was he… upset?

Ven could no longer ask, because Vanitas had left.

 

“Vanitas?”

“You want to know something.”

“Mhm. What happened after… you left my heart?”

A cluster of mushrooms, their hats like the mantle of a jellyfish, floating in the air. Today Vanitas seemed to be in a quiet mood.

Ven wasn’t sure when, but he had started thinking of the periods where Vanitas was there as “days”, and the periods where he wasn’t as “nights”. It was the only way that he could track the passage of time – day, when they interacted, night, when he was alone. But maybe it should have been the other way around. Wasn’t Vanitas the darkness?

“I trained. So that I could make the χ-blade, with you.”

A bird, a yellow pot. Ven didn’t know what the bird had meant, but the pot had been anger… probably over the failed weapon.

“Did he make you fight those things, the Heartless?”

“He didn’t _make_ me fight anything. He gave me suggestions as to what I could face to become stronger and offered enemies for me to defeat.”

The Unversed that looked like a massive ape.

But Ven knew that Vanitas’s words were hollow. It was a way of saying something only technically true. Xehanort had never “made” Ven fight either. He had given orders, brought opponents, but never actually forced his hand. That was why they were there, like this, two separate beings who had grown while apart. Because he had failed to do what his Master wanted.

“So you fought them.”

“Sometimes.”

“What else did you fight?” What else was there, really? Back before things had become twisted – no, before Xehanort’s true desires came to the surface – there had been drills, training dummies, artificial enemies to practice on. But Vanitas had all of the memories of those drills as well, and so there would have been no point in doing them again. “Not Unversed, huh…”

“Yes.”

“What?”

The Unversed that looked like an hourglass. It turned over, to reveal a smiling face tumbling in the sand.

“What does that mean?”

“Do you not understand the word “yes”? I fought them, stupid.”

“You… fought with your own emotions?”

The hourglass flipped, twice.

“What of it?”

Ven didn’t know how to reply. The smiling hourglass had somehow felt like satisfaction, of things going as planned. Control. It was Vanitas’s pleasure at being able to win out against his feelings.

The face that had briefly appeared in the sand hadn’t been smiling.

Vanitas left him.

 

“The yellow pot.” It was the third time that Vanitas had approached him peacefully. Ven didn’t know how to feel about it. He thought that Vanitas had grown used to his presence, his attention. In the silence of another’s body, there was only the two of them. Vanitas’s foot landed gently on the station of his heart, and he merely looked at the other boy as he stepped forward.

“What about it?”

“You wanted to know.” Ven _had_ asked. But Vanitas had left, when he’d pressed.

“It’s anger, you said.” If he let Vanitas lead the conversation, would he actually answer? It seemed like it he might. Ven said nothing more, and simply waited.

“It is.” Vanitas didn’t elaborate, and simply waited without meeting his eyes. Staring off into the distance. There was something in his expression that Ven couldn’t read in the slightest. Anticipation? No. A blue pot.

“… What kind of anger is it?”

“Being angry at weakness.”

“At me.” It was no secret that Vanitas had looked down on him for it, his seeming weakness. Ven wondered how it had felt to be defeated by someone who was “weak”.

Vanitas said nothing for a while. And then…

“Who knows.”

Vanitas knew.

“But you failed too, didn’t you?”

Silence. The rabbit. The creature with pickaxes in the place of hands. The boot. The single jellyfish.

“Do you… hate yourself?”

“Do you?” A deflection, not an answer. The blue pot. The brute with shields. The yellow pot. The Scrapper. The balloon. So many, in such quick succession. A series of complicated thoughts and emotions.

Vanitas didn’t look at him.

“Do I hate you?” The question was worrying, because Ven no longer knew the answer. Was Vanitas different, or was he different? Something had certainly changed – his understanding, Vanitas’s understanding, Vanitas’s behavior, his behavior, his feelings, Vanitas’s feelings. One of those had changed. Which was it?

“Do you hate _you._ ” Floods. Irritation that he had misunderstood the question. Ven didn’t need to think much on it, though. The truth came easily, at least for him. He didn’t think it was so easy for Vanitas.

“Sometimes.” Vanitas said nothing, and so he continued. “Then, the other pots… What’s red?”

“Happiness.” Ven waited, and Vanitas finished the thought. “The happiness I feel when I’ve irritated someone.”

“… Right.”

He felt… bad. Everything Vanitas had told him about his emotions… nothing was genuinely happy. Everything had a layer of pain.

Irritation. Happiness at another’s tears. Anger, at weakness. Happiness at another’s irritation. With all the unknown Unversed that had flashed across his mind, leaking in from Vanitas, had he ever sensed _actual_ joy?

“Have you ever…”

Vanitas met his eyes finally, his face scrunched up in a squint. He looked almost as if he was in pain, and then he quickly averted his gaze once more. Suddenly, Ven realized what he had just seen. Looking at him was painful for Vanitas, at least in that moment. Why?

“Vanitas.”

“What.”

“Have you ever felt… have you ever been happy at something besides someone else suffering?”

The ape, tearing up the ground and sending massive chunks of rock everywhere.

“Power.”

“You mean power to destroy things.”

“Yes.”

“That’s someone else suffering.”

“Then… Winning.”

The Unversed that looked like a machine, that flipped upside-down to fire on him.

“Vanitas...”

“You.”

A cluster of purple pots.

“What?”

“I felt good. When I saw you again.”

“Because you knew you would be able to fight me.”

“My Unversed were going to make you stronger.” Something in Vanitas’s voice sounded… strange. Ven couldn’t grasp its form. A ripple echoed out from his heart, and Vanitas clenched his fingers into fists in response to it. A rabbit. The jellyfish. The rabbit again. What did his emotions look like to Vanitas? What did the other boy see?

“What do you expect? I’m the darkness in your heart. My joy is the pain of others. I am your pain.”

“But I still _feel_ pain. You’re no longer a part of my heart, but I can still hurt. I can still feel bad and get angry. Isn’t the reverse true? You can still feel things that are wholly good, can’t you?”

A blue pot. The rabbit. The bat-like creature. A long period of silence. A cluster of purple pots. The burrowing plant.

“No.”

Vanitas left.

 

The night that followed was particularly long.

 

Something flickered at the corner of his eye. It was a distant glow, and he narrowed his eyes to try and make it out. All Ven could see was a ring of pale light. Far, far off, it felt like someone’s heart. Someone he didn’t know.

“Vanitas?”

From somewhere else, Vanitas’s voice echoed.

“What do you want?”

“I was wondering something.”

“You better not waste my time.”

“Xehanort.” An Unversed with arms like thorny vines that spun like a top, the boot, the hourglass that didn’t smile, the jellyfish, the yellow pot. Their former master was complicated for both of them. “Was he… _nice_ , to you?”

“Idiot. I can’t believe you had to ask that.” Overwhelming negativity, spilling out like a wave from somewhere in the emptiness. Ven glanced backwards, looking for the pale circle of another’s heart. Would the darkness flowing from Vanitas be able to reach it? That heart seemed to be of pure light. He couldn’t let Vanitas’s emotions stain it with darkness.

“I… I’m sorry.” It wasn’t an apology for asking a stupid question, and Vanitas knew it as well as he did.

The rabbit.

Vanitas’s fist slammed into his cheek, shattering it. It sent him flying, his balance lost, his thoughts scattered. Ven landed hard, the pain of what felt like betrayal sinking into his heart. Why? Vanitas had been his enemy from the start. How could the other boy betray him when this should have been what he expected all along?

Before he could react, a hand had him by the throat. It felt wrong, a hand that was too large. An adult’s hand. Not Vanitas, though Vanitas had taken hold of him and was lifting him up. It was his action, but it was…

A memory. A hand clad in a white glove, the frantic, pounding staccato of a heart. His feet, lifted from the ground.

The memory of Xehanort sent terror throughout his very being. Ven didn’t breathe here, didn’t need to, but he felt as if everything had been sucked out of his lungs. He didn’t have flesh here, but it was cold and he was already shaking. Though he didn’t know how, a cold sweat was beading on the skin he didn’t truly have.

It was a memory, one that Vanitas was using to try to hurt him.

It was working.

He couldn’t remember when it had happened. Surely, it was a part of what he had willfully locked away that Vanitas had dug through him to find. So much of those memories were locked away. Ven kicked his feet, remembering Xehanort’s hand again, cracking his helmet before freezing his body solid.

They dropped him at the same time, Xehanort in a memory of torment, Vanitas in his heart.

“Don’t you dare,” Vanitas hissed, and then he was gone.

 

“I know you’re mad at me,” Ven said. Vanitas gave him no reply in words.

He felt the memory of Vanitas hitting him, a heavy downward strike.

Ven said nothing more for a long time.

 

Outside of the station of his heart, Ven could see nothing. The faint light of another heart had been just that – faint. The boy they were sheltered in had met someone pure, and he had seen a connection being made. Somehow, he knew that.

His own connection was more stubborn.

He saw a flock of mushrooms surrounding Vanitas, and closed his eyes.

Ven didn’t know what he was trying to do. He didn’t want to be friends, not with Vanitas. He didn’t want to “fix” him, and he didn’t know if it was even possible to get through to him.

He just thought that… Vanitas’s entire existence had, perhaps, been very sad.

The rabbit Unversed, after some time, had started to make sense. He’d seen it more than once, speaking with the other boy. It was… not anger, or frustration. Negativity towards being seen as weak. Hatred of pity? Not hatred. But a response to what Vanitas had viewed as pity.

Ven wondered if by himself in a corner of their small existence, Vanitas was lonely.

 

“Vanitas?”

“What.” A response, at least.

“Is there anything you like to do?”

In the distance, a warm glow. It quickly vanished, before he could even direct his gaze to it. To the place from where Vanitas’s voice emanated.

“No.”

“… oh.”

 

“Hey.”

“What is it?” Though he couldn’t see the other boy, Ven turned his head to face where his “voice” was rippling out from. Vanitas’s reaction to it was so faint that he couldn’t figure out what it was. Probably irritation. Vanitas seemed like he would be annoyed to think of Ven knowing where he was.

“I was just…”

“You were wondering something.” Vanitas’s voice was closer, but he hadn’t emerged from the blackness. He was glad. If Vanitas didn’t want to approach him, he wouldn’t attack. Ven crossed his legs, ankle over thigh, and furrowed his brow.

“Kinda, yeah. No, I was. We’ve been like this for a while, haven’t we?”

“Sleeping, you mean.”

“Yeah. Do you know how long it’s been? I can’t tell, but I figured you might be able to.”

“Why would you think that?” It was suspicious. Ven thought of the Scrapper, but he didn’t think that it had come from Vanitas’s thoughts that time. Maybe he was wrong to think that it represented distrust.

“I’m not sure. I just had a feeling that it’s something that you would know how to do.”

Ven felt a warmth starting to spread through his chest. Was something happening to the boy outside? It didn’t feel like it was the case. It felt… nice. Feeling the warmth of another person, after so long.

“How long do you think it’s been?”

“I really don’t know, I wasn’t joking about that. If I had to guess, I’d say it was about a year.”

Vanitas was quiet for a moment.

“It’s been a little over two years.”

“That long… but my heart is still wounded.”

He felt cold.

“You saw it, didn’t you? When that other heart connected.”

“Yeah. Do you know who it was?”

“No. A heart of light.” Vanitas said nothing about a desire to claim it, to weaponize it, and simply continued. “That was a year ago now.”

Then it had been over a year since they’d last fought, other than that punch that had blindsided him. Ven looked down at the green glow of his heart’s station, but only briefly. It really was dangerous to look away from Vanitas for too long, even if he couldn’t truly see him. The place that he directed his gaze was only a guess.

“Is that so… That was him meeting someone, wasn’t it? The boy.”

“Yes.”

“Vanitas?”

“What?”

“Why… are we still here?”

Something was leaking in from Vanitas, and Ven recalled the plant Unversed with the vines in place of arms. It felt overpowering, massive. For a moment, its image was overlaid on the Vanitas in his mind and he saw those vines wrap around him, felt the pain of thorns.

“Vanitas?”

“Figure it out yourself,” Vanitas said, and then night came.

 

“When you were with those two,” Vanitas’s voice sounded almost directly in his ear, and Ven jumped. The laughter he got in response was embarrassing, but it didn’t feel particularly vicious. “You didn’t even know I was there.”

In the distance, a warm glow. He wanted to look, but turning his attention from Vanitas felt dangerous once more.

“Of course I didn’t,” Ven grumbled, feeling his face heat. He wondered if Vanitas knew what embarrassment felt like. He doubted it. “It’s probably easy for you, huh. You always know exactly where I am.”

“It’s impossible not to. Even if I’m not looking, that light’s piercing through me. It’s annoying.”

It hadn’t occurred to him. Lingering in darkness like that, having adjusted to it, did it hurt Vanitas’s eyes to see light? He wondered if his presence had been painful to the other boy all along. It wasn’t something he could be blamed for, Ven reminded himself. He couldn’t help the fact that he shone with light. His moment of sympathy faded into exasperation.

“Well, _so_ sorry about that.”

Vanitas laughed again, and stepped out of the shadows. The smile on his face was genuinely amused, and Ven hunched over in what he knew was undeniably a sulking gesture. Despite that, the light of his heart seemed particularly bright, reaching out further into the void around them. He wasn’t scared. Vanitas was just… harmlessly annoying.

The other boy sat, crossing his legs, ankle over knee. If he were Vanitas, it would have been such a blatant opening that he could have taken. Ven wondered if Vanitas knew he wouldn’t strike. But he _did_ take the opportunity, while Vanitas was settling down and not looking at him, to glance off into the distance at the glow.

It wasn’t that his heart was brighter, Ven realized abruptly. It was that more light that was joining it. He only had a moment to consider it. Even if it seemed like Vanitas definitely wouldn’t attack, he couldn’t say for certain.

After all, he had only gotten the faintest glimpse at Vanitas’s heart.

“Anyway, you were saying?”

“When you were with those two-”

“You mean Terra and Aqua?”

A Scrapper. The rose.

“Yeah. Them. What did you even do together?”

“What? We just… hung out. They helped me train, Master Eraqus too. Aqua taught me how to use magic, I used to be really bad at it. Before I could use my keyblade, Terra lent me the wooden one he had used when he was younger.”

The rose, again. Vanitas rolled over onto one side, facing away from him. He felt vines wrapping around Vanitas, stronger. He didn’t know if it was that the other boy was making full contact with his heart, letting him feel his entire being. What Vanitas was feeling was awful, painful.

The light he could see out of the corner of his eye faded.

“It’s stupid.”

“What?”

“It was a toy.”

“I mean… it wasn’t an actual keyblade, no. But it wasn’t… It was a keepsake. I guess I really treasured it! But I didn’t need it anymore. So I figured I’d leave it with… On one of the worlds I visited, I left it with a lot of other treasures that some of the people I met were gathering together. I’m not sure why. It just felt like the right thing to put in there. I still have all the memories of it, so I didn’t lose anything even if I gave it up.”

“In Neverland.”

The blue pot. The Scrapper. The jellyfish. The rose thorns, cutting deeper and deeper into him. It hurt terribly, and Ven felt his pulse start to climb in response to that pain.

“Yeah, how did you…” Thorns, piercing him. Something dark was seeping from Vanitas, a deep, muddled red that matched the color of his boots. It spilled out onto the platform, and he seemed to grow smaller, as if he was melting. “Did you… do something?”

“Tch.” A stack of Unversed. The top and center shifted, blue trading with yellow, leaving red on the bottom each time. Then, suddenly, red took the center, knocking the other two out of the way, and Vanitas sat up again. His smile was wide, unhinged, a smile he hadn’t seen in almost two years. “I took it. It was easy. If they treasured those things so much, they would have paid more attention to me opening the chest. It broke so easily, I didn’t even have to try.”

The pain of the thorns was still digging into him, and Ven felt like he would collapse. Vanitas had… what? He couldn’t understand. But the memory that Vanitas was recalling played in his head, while the rose thorns whipped at the red center, Unversed battling Unversed inside of Vanitas’s mind. His feelings were warring, the red center winning. The memory played. Vanitas, holding the wooden keyblade that Terra had given him, as if taunting Aqua with the sight of it.

“ _I think that kid’s outgrown such a childish toy, if you ask my opinion.”_

The sight of it snapping in half, sending wood fragments everywhere. The clatter of it hitting the ground as Vanitas tossed it aside. Panting, Ven leaned forward to plant his hands on the glass of his heart. Vanitas was sinking into it, the way he had when they fought, and the dark stain of his hidden body raced to the edge of the platform before vanishing completely. His laughter trailed after it, wild, frantic, unstable.

“Vanitas!” His voice was hoarse, pain and manic joy from Vanitas, anger from himself.

There was no reply.

 

Mushrooms, swarming around a scene. The stack, scattered and defeated. Only blue remained upright, yellow twitching gently, red completely still. The rose still fought, battered by shields.

Ven didn’t know what would win, nor did he know what was truly fighting.

Vanitas didn’t approach him.

 

“Vanitas?”

There was no reply, only darkness.

 

Ven heard a shuffling noise.

 

Sitting there, surrounded by darkness, his platform the only light, Ven remembered it. Terra’s scolding that had brought him to tears. They spilled down his face now, a crippling longing, a loneliness that tormented him. He missed Terra. He missed Aqua. He missed Master Eraqus. He missed it, being treated gently. More than anything, Ven wanted to see his friends again.

A swarm of mushrooms.

He wandered to the edge of his platform.

“Vanitas?”

A hand found his wrist, extended from the void. Vanitas said nothing. He couldn’t see the other boy’s face. He thought that, probably, it was supposed to be a menacing gesture. It wasn’t. Ven was sure that Vanitas wouldn’t try to pull him off and cast him into the void. Stubborn, reluctant, he wasn’t sure which. But Vanitas was there.

“Vanitas.”

“What.” A strained voice, as if he hadn’t spoken in weeks. Though he was still shrouded in darkness, Ven knew from that hand that Vanitas was standing right next to him.

“Will you tell me about the Unversed?”

“… which one.”

“The rose.”

“That one’s boring. Pick another.”

“The boot?”

“Boring.”

He had to find one that smiled. Vanitas wouldn’t open up to him about anything else.

“The one that looks like a bottle.”

“When other people were confused or lost. It made me happy.”

“I see. Then… the floating mushrooms?”

“No.”

It hurt.

“The bird?”

“When I felt good from taking things.”

It felt bad.

“Vanitas, will you come over here?”

Vanitas said nothing, but didn’t slap his hand away when he brought it to the one still latched around his wrist. Gently, Ven stepped backwards, tugging at the other boy that was his only connection in this world of nothingness. Vanitas stepped forward, into the light of his heart.

For the first time since they had come to this place, his face was masked.

Closed off.

“You don’t want to talk to me.”

The blue pot. No words from Vanitas.

“Are you angry with me?”

The rose.

“Do you want me to leave you alone?”

Mushrooms, everywhere, a surge of emotion that almost knocked him senseless. They filled his mind, nothing but them, clustered together, floating helplessly. Vanitas’s grip on his arm tightened. He knew what they meant.

“You’re lonely.”

The rabbit, cowering behind a jellyfish that shrank in size.

Cowering.

“The rabbi- no. Vanitas, what’s the jellyfish?”

Vanitas’s voice cracked as he spoke. “Fear.”

It stunned him.

“ _You know it scares me, don’t you?” “It’s not like you know what that feels like, though.”_

He’d hurt Vanitas more than he could have ever imagined.

“… what are you afraid of?”

A swarm of faces. Unversed, but they weren’t the emotions that Vanitas was feeling. What he was afraid of was

The bite of thorns. Xehanort, standing above him, his keyblade raised. Claws that dug into his flesh. A pain in his chest. Xehanort’s retreating back. Aqua’s furious glare. The pressure of Xehanort’s hand, tight around his throat, the feeling of his feet leaving the ground. The memory that Vanitas had used as a weapon, the memory that belonged to Vanitas.

Panic. Mind-numbing pain that made his entire body shake. Ven, crumpled on the ground. His own body, though it wasn’t real, was desperate to recreate that memory that lived in Vanitas’s mind.

Ven fell to his knees, and Vanitas didn’t let go of him.

His thoughts were

spinning aimlessly in his mind,

he snatched at them frantically, to try and find words that would make the pain stop.

he was falling

His question had been too vague, dropping him into a churning ocean.

“Th-the jellyfish, when you made that one, what were you. Afraid of?”

Solid ground. A memory. The badlands.

Xehanort, turning and walking away from Ven’s prone form. Vanitas’s backward glance, a hint of apprehension. In that memory, briefly, the face attached to his unconscious body was also masked. A massive jellyfish that enveloped Vanitas, holding him tightly in its mantle. Terra, leaping aboard his keyblade glider and jetting off into the Lanes Between. A fear he was familiar with.

Abandonment.

The stomach that he didn’t have heaved. Vanitas’s grip on him hurt. Ven didn’t know if he wanted him to let go. Vanitas, too, seemed to be fighting against a vicious tide.

“I’m not going to leave you behind.”

A rabbit, cowering behind a massive figure that held shields.

Vanitas yanked him hard, before throwing him down onto the platform and climbing on top of him. The weight of the other boy, of his rage, pain, mortification, was stifling, smothering.

He couldn’t breathe, his chest trapped in a vice made of Vanitas’s pain

“ _Don’t look down on me!_ ”

Ven cried out in pain, but it was choked off as hands – this time, hands that belonged to Vanitas – wrapped around his neck. He squeezed his eyes shut as Vanitas squeezed his throat. Gritting his teeth, making the muscles in his neck strain, gave him no relief from that crushing agony.

“I don’t need it! Your pity, it’s worthless! I don’t need it!” Would Vanitas kill him here? _Could_ Vanitas kill him here? Behind his closed eyelids, he saw sparks. “I’ll kill you, and all of this will-”

“ _It h_ _urts_ -”

Vanitas’s hands fell away from him, and when he opened his eyes the other boy was, himself, being strangled. There were thorns everywhere, trapping his entire body in a painful embrace. Vines coiled around his head, squeezing tight.

Glass cracked and

he saw Vanitas’s face.

Wide yellow eyes shiny with tears, his pupils shrunken to dots. Bloodshot. Thorns were piercing into him, vines cutting into his throat. An Unversed, the rose.

Overwhelming fear

“I didn’t,” Vanitas choked out, barely able to speak. The Unversed that was assaulting him, an illusion that nonetheless was destroying him, didn’t relent. Was it actually there? Formed in the middle of emotions and memories, was that Unversed truly there? “ _What?_ ”

Guilt

Guilt

Guilt

would Vanitas die from it?

Gasping for air, Ven lifted his hands without thinking. The thorns cut into him, tearing his flesh as he tore at them in turn. He heard a _crack_ , then whispering behind him, the sound of sand spilling out of a shattered hourglass. Vanitas’s emotions were manifesting, as much as they could in this place where he had no body to give them form. They were breaking as he broke, and turning on him.

Whole segments of his hands had been shredded, his fingers almost gone completely. Agony was filling him, even as he saw vicious chunks disappearing from Vanitas. Still, he pulled at the vines. There was nothing else he could do. Ven tore at the vines, throwing them to the side where they dissolved like their flesh. Every time he did there were more, but at the very least he was keeping them from cutting off Vanitas's air. He _couldn’t_ -

Something slammed into him from behind, knocking them both forward. A thrown shield. Vanitas writhed, trying to back away from him, trapped by his own uncontrollable feelings. Trying to block out the searing pain, Ven continued to tear the vines from Vanitas’s neck. He had to. They kept coming back. It hurt and he had to do it. There was nothing else.

“ _Leave me alone!_ ”

“I won’t!” It was excruciating, the pain of Vanitas’s emotions trying to destroy him and anything that he touched. “You can’t do this!”

“It’s better, isn’t it!? Because I can’t control this anymore! I had them under control, I could crush them beneath my feet, but when I’m here, with you! Everything’s _wrong!_ If I’m not here, I can-!”

The head that had been in the hourglass rolled past them, its face awash in tears.

“You can control them, I know you can! Of course you can! You just have to accept them and let me help you!”

Another shield hammered at his back. His hands were gone, jagged stumps still being torn at by thorns, cracks spreading between his shoulders as shields rained down on him in thunderous blows. Vanitas was melting, losing form. As he threw what was left of his arms around the other boy, something kicked him, hard, in the side. The boot rolled away, tucking its head back inside like a turtle.

“Stop it! Why are you doing this!? I don’t _need_ your help! Why are you being nice to me, what do you want from me!? Why are you doing it! Haven’t you taken enough from me!?”

The hairs on the back of his neck were rising, but he couldn’t brace himself for the bolt of electricity that tensed his entire body. Curved leaves were firing upon him from all directions, cutting at his knees, stinging with poison. Ven cried out, surrounded on all sides by the faces of Vanitas’s agony. If he didn’t let go, if it didn’t stop, would they both die?

“I don’t want something from you!”

“You’re _lying_! Everyone wants something! Why else would you-”

“Because I’m scared of losing you!”

Everything froze. The emotions that were smothering Vanitas seemed to explode into dust around them, before coalescing into another form. A massive pot, stained blue, that scooped them both up and closed around them.

Uncertainty. Confusion. That was what it was. Inside of that feeling, Ven understood it. Vanitas, frozen in uncertainty, collapsed against him.

“I don’t understand you,” he sobbed, before falling into sleep.

 

Blue faded into purple and then melted away, leaving them to lie in pieces together on the platform of his heart. There was so little of Vanitas left, gouges taken out of his arms and legs, chunks missing from his face. His neck had grown thin, shredded by thorns, a mess of wounds. They were jagged at the edges, like cracked glass. Ven wondered if they would cut into him if he touched them. Vanitas was a shattered glass skeleton, his remaining pieces barely held together in the shape of a human boy.

Vanitas couldn’t look at his heart to read it anymore, because he had fallen so far into the darkness that light seared his eyes. His pain had made him sink further into it, and Ven hadn’t noticed. He couldn’t have noticed. He still felt guilty. They were supposed to hate each other and fight. That was what Xehanort had made them for. He still hated Vanitas, but…

“ _I don’t understand you,_ ” Vanitas had sobbed, what felt like seconds and hours and years before.

“Of course you don’t,” Ven whispered. He wanted to reach out, to brush the hair from Vanitas’s closed eyes. Even if he touched those ragged edges, they wouldn’t hurt him. He wanted to touch. He had no hands to do it with. He was tired. “We’re different, you and me. We’re not the same. That’s okay. We can be different. It’s okay to have darkness inside you. Everyone’s supposed to. That’s why it almost killed me, taking you away. Just don’t let it be everything that you are.”

Tears wet the glass, and Ven didn’t know who they belonged to.

 

It was a day that seemed to last forever, but Vanitas did not wake. It reminded Ven of himself. A broken creature that wouldn’t wake up. With nothing else to do, he waited.

 

Slowly, over a time that stretched out longer and longer, his hands reformed. Slowly, over a time that stretched out longer and longer, the missing chunks of Vanitas’s body filled in once more. Slowly, over a time that stretched out longer and longer, he grew comfortable with the feeling of Vanitas next to him, comfortable with cradling his head in his lap.

 

Slowly, over a time that stretched out longer and longer, a faint light began to shine.

 

“I can finally see it, you know,” Ven said, but Vanitas didn’t reply. His eyes had yet to open. Whether he was listening or not, Ven couldn’t tell. He didn’t know if it would change anything, if it would help, if it would hurt.

They’d hurt each other so much, and for what?

As Vanitas slept, Ven looked out towards it. A circle of red light, like the glow of embers. It might burn him if he touched it, he thought. It might burn them both, the light being born within Vanitas’s heart. A meaningful connection. If he was gentle with it, it would be okay.

Light wasn’t necessarily good. Darkness wasn’t necessarily bad. If they healed, they could have both, and be visible. If they had only one, no one would ever be able to see them.

He looked at Vanitas’s heart, and saw the memories that played in the spheres that gathered around his sleeping figure. They swirled around him, displaying, laying bare the events that had shaped his soul.

A memory of sadness, his first emotion. Of standing, alone, a separate being, an aching desire to return to where he belonged. A memory of contempt that came soon after, of looking down at the being that had been too weak to keep what had been his.

A memory of thought.

“ _I shouldn’t exist.”_

A terrible thought.

“ _I’m not supposed to be here. Why am I here? My Master created me. He’ll tell me why.”_

“ _Master Xehanort wants to create the χ-blade, so that he can begin a new Keyblade War.”_

It evolved, as memories played. A dialogue that stretched over the course of four years. The four years before they had met again.

“ _If I create the χ-blade, I can ignite a conflict that will swallow the entire world.”_

“ _Ventus is too weak. He can’t match me.”_

“ _If he can’t do it, what point is there in keeping him around? I hate him.”_

“ _If I kill him, will I die too? Well, it doesn’t matter.”_

“ _But I have to make the χ-blade. I can’t kill him.”_

“ _I can find someone else to join with.” “It hurts”_

“ _I’ll test him. If he fails, I’ll kill him.” “Pathetic.”_

“ _Master Xehanort will be angry if I kill him.”_

“ _Who cares what he thinks?”_

“ _The χ-blade is what I was born to create.” “Pathetic.”_

“ _I don’t want this.” “No escape”_

“ _Pathetic.” “It hurts”_

“ _He scares me.”_

“ _It feels good to hurt them. I’ll do it more.”_

“ _I want everyone to hurt. I love it, seeing their faces in agony. It’ll be okay.”_

“ _Why won’t he do what I want?”_

“ _I am only half of it. I need another. I’ll forge it and end everything. I’ll bring fire and death.”_

“ _Xehanort wants to see what exists beyond the Keyblade War.”_

“ _It hurts” “I’ll kill him too. He’s pathetic. I hate him.”_

“ _Ventus is worthy.” “We’ll do it together.”_

“ _I want to kill them all. I’ll be free if I kill them all. I’ll kill him first.”_

“ _I’ll take his body and use it. (I want him!) I’ll wield the blade, I’ll kill his friends with his hands._ (They can’t have him!)”

“ _I was made for this! I must do this!”_

“ _His face makes me sick.”“I miss him.”“I want to kill him!”“I hate him!”_

“ _I love to hurt them. I’ll do it more._

“ _Pathetic.” “He didn’t need me! **I hate him!** ”_

“ _Everything will fall into anguish by my hand!”_

_“They’ll suffer.” “Pathetic.”_

“ _Once it’s forged, what will my purpose be? No. It doesn’t matter. I’ll use it to destroy everything, so there will be no “after”.”_

“ _Xehanort wants the χ-blade. He can’t have it. It’s mine.”_

“ _Ventus. (He’s mine!)”_

“ _I want to see him hurt_ too _. I love it.”_

“ _The only thing waiting for us all is everlasting darkness!”_

“ _I don’t need her. Ventus is worthy,_ _no one else will do. I **will** join with him.”_

_“I need Ventus. (I can’t do it alone.) He belongs to me!”_

_“Everyone will fall into anguish and suffering by my hand, and we will all be the same.”_

“ _If we forge it_

 

_will we die?”_

“ _ **I’ll forge it!** ”_

 

And then, so recently.

 

“ _If I can’t be pure darkness, what am I good for?”_

 

Ven cradled Vanitas’s head in his lap, and his eyes swam as tears began to drip onto the other boy’s cheeks. Warped emotions. He’d grown warped so fast, with no one by his side but Xehanort. With no one who loved him, merely encouraged to be cruel and destructive. At first he had done it because it was his Master’s wish. But he had turned on Xehanort too, like all the others. Their wishes had aligned, but he hadn’t planned to hand the blade over to his former master.

The only reason Vanitas had wanted the χ-blade was to end the world, and himself with it.

He had pretended at first, pretended he wanted to see chaos rather than simply seeking his own oblivion. Stacking everything upon that lie, it had become the truth in his heart. Chaos became appealing. The suffering of others began to appeal to him. He liked making others feel like him. It became a wonderful thing, seeing other people in pain. The desire for his own dissolution, warped into joy at the destruction of others. But in the beginning…

“You wanted to be a part of my heart again.”

Could Vanitas have been good? The broken boy who slept below him had undeniably become evil. Was it too late for him to change? He had changed once. Couldn’t he still go back?

There was light in him.

Unwilling to brush away his tears, Ven instead struggled to his feet.

Vanitas was heavy. It was hard to pick him up, to carry the weight of all the hate and rage and fear that still lived inside him. He thought he might be crushed beneath that weight.

It wasn’t darkness that he was stumbling under.

It was just Vanitas.

That was a weight he could bear. He started to walk towards that faint light.

 

At the edge of his heart’s station, a bridge existed. The bridge that Vanitas always took, to cross from the blackness of his own heart and meet with him again. He couldn’t see it well, a faint glimmering. But Vanitas had crossed it over and over again. He could do it too.

As he walked, he spoke.

“You know, I used to really hate you. It seemed like everything you were doing was just a game, like you were having fun hurting me.”

The bridge was only just bright enough to let him know where to place his feet. It curved downwards, because Vanitas’s heart was below his. There was no sense of gravity, of actually walking downhill. The only weight was himself, and Vanitas.

“I know you really were. It actually did make you happy.”

Ven knew he wouldn’t receive a reply. Vanitas’s heart was so dim, the platform missing whole chunks that had fallen into the abyss. He didn’t glance behind him to try and figure out how far he had walked. It didn’t matter how distant it was.

“You’ve never been able to see your own heart, have you? You didn’t even know it was here. Just a dark space. That was why you were so confused when I said I couldn’t see it. You didn’t realize it existed. You thought you were still just a fragment of me. But you stopped being that a long time ago.”

Vanitas’s breath was faint against his neck. He shifted the other boy’s weight a little, looking up into the emptiness.

“I realized it pretty late, didn’t I. You said all these things about your feelings. I only paid attention to what you were saying, and didn’t listen to how you said them. Sorry. Wait, why am _I_ sorry? You're the one who said things in such a weird way.”

Down, down, down. A bridge that went on for a lifetime. Vanitas’s lifetime, his lifetime. The distance between their hearts once they had become distinct.

“I didn’t notice that you were saying all that stuff… all that bad stuff, about liking when other people were in pain… I didn’t notice the way you phrased it. All this stuff you used to feel. But those things stopped being happy to you.”

He could have paid more attention.

“I don’t know when that happened. I guess I wasn’t really listening to you. But you always said things in such a roundabout way, how was I supposed to get what you meant? You could have been more clear, you know! Maybe that would have made things easier for both of us. Being more honest, or… something.”

“And, you know, maybe this is bad. I wonder if I’m going easy on you now that I know more about you. Even with all the awful things you were feeling, you still hurt me on purpose. You hurt Aqua and Terra on purpose. And I do hate you for that. You did things that were terrible. I don’t know if you’re actually sorry.”

“Every time we fought, weren’t we just ripping ourselves back open? That’s why we’re still sleeping. Because we were hurting each other, and ourselves. And you knew that. That was why you felt guilty. You were doing it on purpose so that we would sleep longer, to spite me for winning. Then you started to feel bad.”

“I can’t tell if you care about me or not. I don’t think you know what it feels like to love someone, so I definitely don’t think you love me. In any way, I mean. I don’t love you either. You don’t feel like family to me, and you’re not me, and I don’t want you to be either of those things. It’s okay if our hearts touch, though. Maybe I’ve started to like you, at least a little.”

Vanitas’s heart was so close to him. If he stepped forward, he would set foot on that platform – a platform where, like on his back, Vanitas slept. He was certain that stepping onto it wouldn't hurt either of them. It had been a long time since the act of Vanitas setting foot in his heart had hurt him, after all. The circles that clustered around the image of his head were still now, no longer swirling in a mass of memories. They had stabilized with the things that Vanitas held dear. Three circles. It wasn’t a lot.

Looking down at them, Ven didn’t know how to feel.

“Maybe I’m wrong. Give me a break, though. It’s really hard to see your heart when you just keep hiding it.”

A shattered blade. A purple pot.

He realized it.

“ _I felt good. When I saw you again.”_

“ _Because you knew you would be able to fight me.”_

“ _My Unversed were going to make you stronger.”_

Those purple pots, a group of Unversed.

Quietly, Ven began to laugh. Vanitas hadn’t lied, really. He’d just changed the topic and made it seem like he hadn’t.

“You’re terrible, you know that?”

With as much care as he could, Ven set one foot onto the stained glass. At his back he felt it, the gentle beating of a heart.

“You acted like it was about making me stronger, huh? Those Unversed. Making me fight them.”

Ven took another step forward, past the shattered image of the χ-blade. Vanitas had coveted it, but what he held dear now was the fact that it had broken. Gazing down on the dimly-lit platform, Ven understood why.

“But those Unversed never attacked me even once! I always thought it was weird. Would you have just run away if I asked, the way they ran?”

He had to kneel in order to safely set Vanitas down. Once his weight was no longer against Ven, somehow… it felt cold. There was more to his body now, though. His being was starting to heal. Ven wondered if kindness would help mend them both. He wondered if they were capable of being kind to one another. Part of his being still hated Vanitas, hated the memories he had of him. He didn’t want to just play nice, forgive and forget. But the Vanitas lying on the glass floor wasn’t the Vanitas that had beaten him senseless.

Or, it was, but between then and now he had grown softer. Their hearts had, just barely, touched. Where did light come from? What was it really? How had it began to form inside a heart that had been born steeped in darkness?

“I guess you did feel happy over something that wasn’t bad, even if it was just once. I bet you never would have admitted that you were just happy to see me, though. Maybe you didn’t even know yourself.”

“The Unversed… I think I get it now. What they all mean. No, what they came from. What you drew upon to make them.”

Despite his taunting words, it was Vanitas who hadn’t grown up. Vanitas was like a child, getting upset and throwing tantrums. He hadn’t matured in the slightest, because no one had made him. Ven didn’t think he was up to that responsibility. He wouldn’t take on that task. Vanitas would have to take responsibility for his past, if he was willing to make the effort to do so. Somehow, Ven was certain he would. If Vanitas didn’t, he would simply, quickly, be killed by his emotions. A heart alone was little besides emotions, after all. Memories, and emotions.

Ven sat, crossing his legs, ankle over knee. He could run through them in his mind now, all of the things he had fought, the ones that had come solely from Vanitas. His memories, Vanitas’s emotions.

“The ones that looked like mice, we called those Floods. I don’t know why. I’m not sure who named them, actually… But, that was when you were irritated. Memories of being irritated. And, the ones that looked like little humans with claws. Scrappers, we called them. That was from anxiety, when you didn’t know what was going to happen.”

“The big, bottom-heavy ones… those were Bruisers. That’s when you felt good from making other people cry, huh… You liked it when other people hurt. And those red pots were kind of the same. We called them Red Hot Chilis… It seems kind of like a stupid name. A lot of those names are kind of stupid, now that I think about it. Silly, at least. But those are when you saw people getting frustrated, and felt good from that.”

Ven looked upwards, a vast expanse of nothingness. There were so many Unversed, so many emotions that Vanitas had jettisoned from his body. Was that what he was doing? Giving them form, so that he could banish them from his being? But he could no longer do that and was forced to face them, and was destroyed by things he had never learned to face.

“The things that had pickaxes for arms. That was when you were angry that things weren’t going the way you wanted. We called them Monotruckers. I don’t know what that name’s supposed to mean. The roses… they really hurt you lately. Thornbites. I guess guilt really does bite into a person. At first I… really didn’t think you could feel anything like that. But maybe that’s why you sent them away. So you didn’t have to.”

There was a quiet sigh behind him, but Vanitas didn’t stir.

He had sent away all of the painful feelings, didn’t know how to deal with them.

“I wonder if you had names for them. Shoegazers were the boots, but those are really just from when you were afraid of being struck. That’s why they hide like that. Because you wanted to hurt people, but didn’t want to get hurt.”

“The chests, those were Spiderchests. I guess it’s sort of self-explanatory as a name… You already told me, but that’s when you felt good about tricking people. You probably could make a lot of them just from all the times you played _me_ like an idiot. There’s so many, huh? You forced out all those emotions. Archravens were the birds, you said they were feeling good from taking things from others. But the idea of that doesn’t make you feel good anymore. Hey, can you even hear me? Maybe it doesn’t matter.”

“The rabbits were Hareraisers. I guess you kind of tipped me off already, but that was when you were afraid that people would pity you. Or… look down on you. I don’t pity you, even if you thought I did. I’m pretty angry at you, actually. But I can still sympathize. It hurts to be looked down on.”

“Maybe it’s good. Talking about my feelings and yours.”

He wished Vanitas would wake up.

“The things that looked like mushrooms. Well, I thought they looked more like mushrooms. We called them Jellyshades, so I guess whoever named them thought they looked more like jellyfish. That was… loneliness. That’s why they showed up in groups. It can get overwhelming, I guess. Being lonely. I wonder, did the Unversed make you feel less alone? Probably not. The big balloon men were Tank Topplers. That was your ego, right? Having it bruised, blowing up over it. They were a real pain. Maybe you’d be happy knowing that.”

Looking over at the other boy, Ven noted that nothing about him had changed. Breathing in and out, deep, even breaths. At least there was that much. At least he could escape in sleep.

“The bottles, phials I guess. When you were happy about confusing people. Those were Vile Phials. And Sonic Blasters, they looked like machines. When you were happy about picking a fight, but sad because no one could put up a good one. It’s a weird thing to find sad. Maybe not. If no one could match up, you could never forge it…”

Vanitas curled loosely around the third circle, his eyes closed, his breathing even. Ven didn’t want to stare into Vanitas’s heart too long. It felt… invasive. Instead of reading it, of searching for feelings and memories, he only looked at the depiction of Vanitas’s sleeping face.

The real thing was right next to him, of course.

“The stack of three Unversed with the different faces. That was… feelings about bonds between people. Red was you having fun ripping them apart, but… yellow was envy towards them. Blue was you wanting those kinds of relationships, longing for that. It made you sad. We called them Triple Wreckers. Maybe we should have called them Relationship Wreckers… that’s not really a good joke. Sorry. I’ll have to come up with a better one sometime. The apes, those were Wild Bruisers. You were happy about being able to destroy things, and that’s what you made those from. Man, you really just wanted to bust up everything, didn’t you? I… I think I can understand it. Wanting to break things when you’re unhappy, and feeling better from it. The blue pot… why were they all named after food? Well, not all of them I guess, but this one was Blue Sea Salt. I don’t know what the difference between sea salt and normal salt is. They’re… uncertainty. When you’re frozen up and don’t know what to do. You took that feeling and made them.”

“Vanitas, hey… I feel like I could make a whole swarm of Jellyshades right now. I hope you can hear me. But… there’s still some more Unversed, huh. The yellow pots, those were Yellow Mustard. Food again, right? It’s weird. That’s being mad over weakness. Me, but also you. Was it all you? No, you definitely resented me for that too. I _was_ weak. But I guess I ended up being stronger… Sorry, I won’t rub it in. Mandrakes are those ones that look like plants, that burrow into the ground. That’s you being afraid again, but it’s you being afraid of getting attached to something. No, someone. So they keep their distance, and if you get close they try to poison you… if you hurt someone, they’ll leave, and you won’t have to think about them anymore. That’s not really how it works, you know.”

“The ones with shields… You used them a lot, in here at least. Buckle Bruisers. Why’d we call so many of them bruisers? I guess they were, though. They hit really hard. They’re… getting angry, so that you don’t have to feel other things. Using it as a shield _and_ a weapon. Something to hide behind. What next… The hourglasses, they were Chrono Twisters. You never said, but I worked it out a while back. When it’s smiling, that’s being happy that you’re in control of all the Unversed – all of your feelings. But when it’s sad, it’s you being worried that you aren’t.”

“Axe Flappers were the things that looked sort of like bats. That was… wanting to run away from the things that were unpleasant. To fly away, I guess. They were sort of bad at it. But so were both of us. The bad stuff catches up pretty fast.”

“I feel kind of dumb, you know? Talking to myself like this. Unless you can hear me. Then I'm not doing that at all."

Vanitas shifted quietly. It almost felt taunting, like the other boy was faking being asleep. But maybe it was a way of trying to say he was listening. Maybe it meant nothing at all. The platform seemed brighter. Ven wondered if it was coincidence, a trick his eyes were playing, or something real happening as he sifted through Vanitas’s feelings and put names to them. He thought it might have been something like that. How was light born?

“The big jellyfish with all the spikes, that split into smaller ones. That’s fear of being abandoned. I… get it. That’s what I was scared of most. Everyone leaving me behind. Terra and Aqua, they went off on these missions, and I couldn’t go. I got scared of being left all alone. Ah, I didn’t even say, but we called those Blobmobs. Then there was this kind I only saw in Disney Town, that was bizarre. They were on the race tracks. Glidewinders. That was you feeling impatient. Then, the last one...”

Ven touched the glass beneath him, pointing to the cluster of pots encapsulated within a circle.

“The purple pots, those were the only ones that weren’t named after food… But, they weren’t like the other pots so I guess that’s fine. Like I said, they weren’t like _any_ of the other Unversed. We called those Prize Pods. They didn’t want to fight, just dropped a bunch of food and left. When I went to Disney Town, there were some kids there that used that food to make ice cream. It made them really happy… That was _you_ being happy, happy to see me. Even though you were such an awful guy. I don’t know if I’m flattered or not. Why did you feel like you had to push that emotion away? Just you trying to look tough. I guess that’s all of them, though…”

“I don’t think I can hate all of you anymore. But that doesn’t mean I can love all of you. It’s weird, but… I think I really do want to help you. I don’t know if I can. I mean, have you seen my heart? That’s a dumb question, you definitely have. The point is, I can’t even help myself right now. So maybe I’m not the right person, definitely not right now, but maybe not ever. Maybe someone else will come along who can do it, someone like the boy who’s helping both of us. Maybe he’ll even manage to save us both all by himself. Us… We can’t be one “us” anymore. But it’s probably okay to be an “us” that’s made of two. At least… I’m willing to give it a shot, I guess. You might not be, but who knows? Hey, it’s not like you’re telling me right now.”

Ven traced his fingers over the glass. When a person cared for another, that was light. No matter which it was, caring for someone or being cared for. Either way, that was light. It was something that could hurt and smother, the way Master Eraqus had smothered Terra. And Ven knew he was supposed to be nothing but light, and Vanitas nothing but darkness. The other boy had never cared for anyone. The station of his heart had been pitch-black, without a single other person. The only time it hadn’t been the case was years ago, when they had clashed and Vanitas’s heart had invaded his and their platforms had become one.

“I guess… I’ll stay here, until you wake up. Because it… feels nice to have someone who wants to see you again. Someone who’s waiting for you. Someone who’s there for you. At least, it feels nice to me.” Vanitas shifted quietly, still asleep. Ven looked over to him, and ran his fingers down Vanitas’s real cheek. It was just as smooth as the glass, and just as warm. Alive. Though they slept here, together, inside of a young boy’s heart, they were both truly alive. Maybe, some day, they would leave this place and be reborn. Here, together and alone, was a place that was neither day nor night. He sat there in the twilight, and stroked Vanitas’s hair as he slumbered.

“Maybe you’d like that too.”

 

As Ven watched, Vanitas’s hand brushed across it, the stained glass image of his face.

 

“Hey… you know, you can call me Ven.”


End file.
